Trace Evidence. Carla Cassidy

to the Redbud, I hate to end our visit with talking about them.”

      Tamara reached across the table and took her friend’s hand in hers. “You can’t carry it alone, Alyssa. Don’t you realize that’s what friends are for, to share not only joys, but burdens as well.”

      Alyssa squeezed her hand, then released it and leaned back in the booth. “I’ve had one vision that has become more and more frequent in the last two weeks and it’s driving me crazy because I don’t know where it’s coming from.”

      Tamara smiled at her. “Might I remind you that you never know where they come from.”

      Alyssa flashed a quick grin. “Okay, that might be true, but this one feels different…more vivid…more intense…more powerful.” She leaned forward once again, her gaze troubled. “I see a man, one of the most handsome men I’ve ever seen…dark hair, eyes like blue ice and a smile that could melt a glacier on a winter day.”

      “Have you ever seen him before? I mean, outside of your visions?”

      Alyssa shook her head. “Trust me, if I’d seen him outside a vision, I’d remember him. Anyway, in the vision, he’s making love to me and then he’s being stabbed and he’s dying in my arms.” She shuddered and took a sip of her iced tea. “Anyway, this is one of the worst I’ve had in a long time and it always bothers me when they’re recurring.”

      “But you’ve had recurring visions that never came to anything before, right?” Tamara asked.

      “Right,” Alyssa said after a moment of hesitation. “Enough about this. Walk me home and I’ll give you a double-dip cone on the house. I got in some of that caramel toffee ice cream that you love.”

      “You’ve got a deal.” Together the two women got up from the booth.

      It was almost an hour later when Tamara got into her car and headed home. Her heart was warmed by the time she had spent with Alyssa. She’d love to have a special man in her life, but special friends were important, too.

      As she drove down Main Street at a leisurely pace, her senses took in the sights and sounds that were so familiar to her.

      When she’d been growing up her family had lived twenty miles outside of Cherokee Corners. Every Saturday her parents and she would get into the car and drive to town for grocery shopping, art supplies and whatever else the family might need.

      She’d loved coming into town. Even though through the week she rode a bus to and from the Cherokee Corners schools, those Saturday trips of leisure time in Cherokee Corners had been magical.

      It had only been since her return to Cherokee Corners from New York that she’d begun some volunteer work at the Cherokee Cultural Center. There she had met Alyssa and her Aunt Rita, Clay’s mother.

      Clay. There was absolutely no reason for him to be in her thoughts as much as he had been throughout the day. She had no explanation for it.

      Since she’d returned from New York she had immersed herself in Cherokee ways and traditions, reclaiming the soul she’d nearly lost to Max and New York.

      Eventually when she chose the man she would marry, he’d be a warrior, proud of his heritage, strong in tradition and with the Cherokee loving heart.

      Everything she had heard about Clay James indicated he was not the warrior her heart sought. She resolutely shoved thoughts of him out of her mind and focused on the fact that she had two lovely weekend days ahead of her to indulge in her first love…painting.

      Thanks to Max, she no longer had to beg art galleries to showcase her work, rather she had galleries requesting showings.

      She tucked away every penny she made, knowing that Native American paintings were hot now, but there may come a day when she wouldn’t be able to give her work away.

      Her parents had encouraged her talent and creativity from a very early age, but they had also instilled a level of practicality, which is why she had gotten her teaching degree despite the fact that painting was her first love.

      She pulled down the dirt lane that would take her to her cottage, a sense of homecoming filling her up inside. The moment she’d seen the place, she’d thought of it as her own little enchanted cottage in the woods.

      She’d known instinctively that it was a place where her creativity would thrive. The woods held a primal serenity that seemed to wrap her in its arms.

      As she approached the cottage, she frowned. There was something on her porch…something that didn’t belong there. She shut off her engine and sat for a long moment, trying to identify the dark bulk that was right in front of her front door.

      Whatever it was, it wasn’t moving. She got out of the car, feeling a bit unsteady on her feet as she approached the porch.

      A deer. A doe, actually. Lifeless, with soft brown eyes staring toward the heavens, it looked pitifully small.

      Tamara sent up a prayer for the soul of the doe, at the same time wondering how it had gotten on her front porch. Had it been hit by a car and somehow stumbled here, broken and bleeding?

      She bent down to get a better look, to try to discern what injuries the poor thing had sustained. Her blood chilled as she saw the claw marks that marred the tan hide of the doe’s side. The claw marks looked like the ones that had marked her classroom walls. What was going on?

      Fear walked up her backbone with icy fingers as she looked around. The surrounding woods was beginning to take on the shadows of twilight, creating dark pockets of shadows that she recognized would make perfect hiding places.

      With trembling fingers, she unlocked her front door and stepped over the dead deer. She stood in the threshold of her home, listening for a sound that didn’t belong, smelling the air for an alien scent, needing to be sure the sanctity of her home hadn’t been breached before she entered farther.

      She heard nothing, smelled nothing, but was spooked beyond belief. She hurried across the living room, grabbed her cordless phone and punched in 911.